Jon Adler has an interesting post about "the intersection of science and public policy" and the "danger of politicizing science." In the public square these days, the charge is common that the Bush Administration (by opposing embryo-destroying medical research, etc.) is particularly guilty of "politicizing science." Among other things, Adler quotes this, from a USA Today article on the subject:
Science policy professor Daniel Sarewitz of Arizona State University in Tempe says: "I think the opportunity to use science as a political tool against Bush has been irresistible — but it is very dangerous for science, and for politics. You can expect to see similar accusations of the political use of science in the next regime." . . .
It is easy to acknowledge (it's impossible not to) that people (left and right) often maintain "policy"-related and other views in the face of "science"-based objections that the factual predicates for these views do not obtain. I gather the worry about "politicizing" science is not merely about this kind of reaction, but about a more unsettling strategy: Identifying first, using non-"scientific"-means, one's policy preferences, and then construct defenses of those preferences using apparently (but not really) "scientific" methods and conclusions (and discarding "scientific" methods and conclusions that are in tension with one's policy preferences). This seems, well, "bad", but it's not at all obvious to me that contemporary "conservatives" (if the Bush Administration is "conservative") are any more guilty of this kind of thing than anyone else.
An even deeper worry, though, might be about those who insist -- and it seems like lots of people do insist -- that all important questions *are* scientific questions, and *can* be answered through scientific methods. But, of course, even at its best, science can only supply the material to which we apply moral principles and prudential reasoning. So, when people say -- and many do -- that the "scientific" answer to the stem-cell debate (as opposed to the "sectarian") answer is the permissive one, it seems that they are missing this point.
UPDATE: Prof. Ellen Wertheimer, of the Villanova University School of Law, kindly passed on this link to the USA Today piece from which Prof. Adler quoted.
UPDATE: My colleague, Carter Snead -- a law-and-science scholar -- writes in with this:
. . . Virtually none of the hot-button issues at the intersection of science and public policy/law are "scientific questions." They are, at bottom, normative disagreements about which science (by design) has nothing to say, other than to provide clarity regarding the factual predicates of such disputes. For example, human embryology can shed light on when and how a new member of the species comes into being, but it is utterly silent on the question of what is owed to the human embryo, or how this obligation might stand in relation to other goods such as the freedom to conduct basic scientific research aimed ultimately at the relief of dread diseases or debilitating injuries. These are moral questions. And in democratic republic such as ours, they are properly understood as "political" (and perhaps, by extension, legal) questions.
Wednesday, August 8, 2007
Rick has mentioned the milestone of the Mirror of Justice’s anniversary and the suggestion that contributors offer some focused reflection on Catholic Legal Theory and the objectives of the MOJ project. During my three year’s of participation, I have expressed my thoughts on a number of occasions. Given the context of commemorative postings, I would like to present a few more thoughts.
Catholic Legal Theory has actually been around for quite some time. The corpus of writings by many Catholic authors—lay and clerical—spanning the centuries has often examined questions dealing with common life or, if you will, the common good and the ordered regulation of human activity.
Perhaps imperfectly but with genius sprinkled through the mixture, many of these writings by Catholic authors have provided an objective counterpoint to subjective legal theories. From Augustine to Aquinas to More to Suárez and de Vitoria to Acton to Rommen to Maritain to the many gifted writers of the present day (including George, Glendon, Finnis, Hittinger, and several MOJ contributors!), we can identify Catholic Legal Theory as a lens through which the human person, the family, society, the state, the nation, and the international community can be viewed individually and together simultaneously. The common denominator to these many Catholic perspectives (even from Catholic authors who do not necessarily define themselves as Catholic authors) is recognition that sound legal theory must simultaneously incorporate the moral, the objective, and the transcendent in the legal order. It is through this order (as opposed to one that is subjectively derived or defined) that the human person, the family, society, the state, the nation, and the international community can better understand not only independence from one another but their vital interdependence with one another. In short, I think Catholic Legal Theory is disposed to ensuring that each of these components of the exercise of human nature exists in right relationship with one another and in right relationship with the Author who made us all. Other legal theories, while interesting and even fascinating, tend to be oriented more to the posited viewpoint that cannot as easily, if at all, recognize and insist on these critical connections.
In addition, I think the Catholic Legal Theorist is not satisfied with his or her participation in this project solely as an intellectual enterprise. I will suggest that the Catholic Legal Theorist is energized by the zeal of the disciple and the call to holiness to propose—not impose—to fellow citizens and to all members of the human family the practical implementation of Catholic Legal Theory through argument based on not just reason but on right reason.
I think I’ll stop at this point and await the reflections of my fellow MOJ contributors. RJA sj
Looking through the Summer issue of the Yale Law Report -- and feeling, as I always do when I read the report, slow-moving and uninteresting -- I came across this "Wish List for the New Administration." (The unspoken premise of the piece, I guess, is that "the New Administration" can actually be expected to consult and respond to the list!) So: Heather Gerken suggests a "democracy index", or "ranking index for state election administration practices (For more about Heather's proposal, click here.); Michael Graetz urges the adoption of a value-added tax, which would generate the revenue necessary to fund a sweeping income-tax exemption; Bill Eskridge suggests a number of measures designed to better protect LGBT Americans from discrimination and violence, and so on.
Two of the wish-list items -- Peter Schuck's and Jack Balkin & Reva Siegel's -- caught my attention.
Continue
reading
Tuesday, August 7, 2007
This is one of those "controversies" that completely escapes me. Still, interesting reading.
